Libraries may get saved

Council members say votes are there to sustain branches, community centers

Danielle, 9, and Debbie Schaeffer hunt down a book in the Poplar-White Station branch of the library. Members of the Memphis City Council say that of the five libraries and four community centers Mayor Willie Herenton proposed closing, all but the Cossitt library branch downtown will remain open.

Freddie Felt searches for her next good book at the Poplar-White Station branch of the library, which she visits at least twice a month. "It's a treasure for the neighborhood," she said.

Mike Brown/The Commercial Appeal

The City Council has effectively rejected Memphis Mayor Willie Herenton's plan to close five libraries and four community centers.

"The majority is not going to go with (closing the libraries)," said Councilman Shea Flinn, one of nine members who are new to the 13-member body this year.

A council budget committee on Wednesday chopped Herenton's request for $1 million to buy land for two new regional libraries.

While a final vote is still to come, council members say the votes are there to keep the libraries open, except for the deteriorating Cossitt branch Downtown. They want to keep open the Gaston, Highland, Levi and Poplar-White Station branches.

Council members said the Herenton administration did not consult them about its plans for the library system and that the council would discuss soon the future of the Memphis Public Library and Information Center.

In addition, a council committee recently decided to fund the four community centers Herenton proposed closing -- Bethel-LaBelle, Greenlaw, Hamilton and Magnolia, also known as Simon-Boyd.

Herenton proposed closing the five libraries and purchasing two new sites in an effort to move the library system toward a more regional model, where patrons from various neighborhoods would use the regional sites instead of local libraries.

Before Kenneth Moody, director of the Division of Public Services and Neighborhoods, could even give the administration's views on closing the libraries, Councilwoman Barbara Swearengen Ware made a motion, seconded by Councilman Jim Strickland, to strike the $1million.

"Can you allow us to present what the recommendations for the libraries are?" asked Moody.

"I'll give you that courtesy," said Ware, who later made the motion to yank the funding.

Herenton said closing the community centers and library branches would save the city $2million annually.

"Some of these people can't go to regional libraries," said Councilman Bill Boyd, who toured the libraries and community centers with Councilman Edmund Ford Jr. "A good many of these people don't have the means to get to these places.

"A lot of children use them, they do their homework and research there," said Boyd. "There's a lot of gray-haired people like me there and kids come right over from school and use them."

Curtis White, head of Friends of the Poplar-White Station Branch Library, said he was happy to hear that the libraries will remain open because they play such an important role in the everyday lives of their customers.

"There's too many people that use the libraries for resource material," said White. "I think if you cut off the access to the computers in those neighborhoods, they may not be able to go to another library."

Herenton said the recommendation to close the libraries and community centers came out of a $700,000 efficiency study by Deloitte Consulting LLP that was delivered last year.

The study said problems at the library system and other city divisions were the result of the Herenton administration's lack of vision and strategic planning.